what you need to do is make the union responsible for the quality of teachers. Since you cant disolve the union, and eductaion is a matter of national security and a future for the country, the goverment should do the following.  Create a seperate division to do quality control in highschools across america.  Cameras would be put up in each classroom in america, and random samplings of tapes sent in to the office, plus on site monitoring, to check equipment, staff efficiency and to make sure the students are being taken care of properly.  If a standard is not met, or a bad teacher found, then there will be monetary fines or penalties to the untion.  Since the union is protecting the bad employees jobs, why not hold them accountable.  This way, the union will be probably doing thier own quality control, and they will be more adiment about making sure teachers have proper traiing and are in a state of mind fit to teach.

The only solution ofc is for US troops to swarm the capital and install a military government. I am personally in favor of that outcome atm, and it would be funny looking at the faces of the democrats.

hmz..deja vu ?

"Union Control and Democrat made laws."

Does he mean union as in "the North", as opposed to the Rebs?

"What are you, a fry cook? In most professional fields your skills and what you bring to the table--what results you produce--are a matter of profit to your employer."

Currently studying to be an architect and an engineer, I've worked with an architectural firm, a general contractor, and an FM Systems firm for co-op.  In each of those firms the people who had been there longer, regardless of their skill sets, were making more money.  The architectural firm I worked for had an architect who couldn't work a basic CAD program (Computer Aided Drafting) and even Microsoft Excel was a little over their head but he was still making more money than the guy who could make his computer dance and knew every code and technical standard by heart.  To put that in perspective the older architect drawing by hand could finish a floor in the time it took the younger one on the computer to finish a building.  I've found the favour shown to experience over training is most visible in professional fields because the people who run these businesses know that there is a jarring difference between how things are supposed to work and how they do; training, in my experience, only covers the former.

"It doesn't matter what teachers show. Many of them show they are not qualified."

As I mentioned if you can read you are qualified to teach, hell in most cases that makes you over qualified.

"Maybe without union protection you would have had better teachers than the incompetent ones you described whose employment could not be terminated?"

Doubtful, my teachers weren't lazy because they didn't fear being fired but because there was no incentive to do well.

"When age is more important than skill, when seniority is more important that performance,"

It's not age it's experience.  Training and knowledge is valuable, that's why they hire young people with that knowledge, but again there's knowing how it's supposed to work and knowing how it does work.  Is a man who's been instructed on the technical operation of a jack hammer better to have than someone who's repeatedly used a jack hammer?  This is also why my employers preferred hiring college students to university students.  Having technical knowledge in a field is worthless if you aren't able to apply that knowledge.

">>As I mentioned if you can read you are qualified to teach, hell in most cases that makes you over qualified.<<

If that's your only standard for what you think makes a proficient educator, then we have nothing to discuss."

Is it my only standard? no.  It is the minimal qualification to teach.  If you can read you can orate the instructions in the textbook to the class.  Doesn't make you a good teacher, doesn't even make you a descent teacher, but a teacher none the less.

">>Doubtful, my teachers weren't lazy because they didn't fear being fired but because there was no incentive to do well.<<

Keeping your income if your work is up to standards and losing it if you do not is a hell of an incentive."

That's the thing they were teaching to standards.  The told us the material, tested us on the material, and we passed.  Even if they were to raise the standards they had to work to they'd just meet those standards and that'd be all.  If you want exceptional teachers you need to provide them with incentive to be exceptional.

lol When the first post in a new thread is extremely flawed, I don't think it should be responded to =p

You're right. Your schoolboard has no control over the education it controls. Every school system is as bad as the one you described.

I don't see anything he posted here as indicating he's a "nut."

Schools in many areas are horrendous. There are schools in NYC where teachers are payed to sit in rooms and do nothing because they're too dangerous (some dangerous sexually, some violently) to let near students, but their unions protect their jobs too well to fire them. He made a reference to Democrats, but they have been the advocates of status-quo, no change but to spend more as the only thing they'll support.

I'm sure his content appears insane to you, seeing as you haven't posted any. We don't feel obligated to engage cocky 10 year olds in any sort of exchange.